No Age Made Sweatstock a Happy Pit

Sweatstock's sweatiest moment came at the end. By the time noise-punk duo No Age finally stumbled onstage around 9 p.m., the crowd was bigger, drunker, and more chaotic than it had been all day. Fans of every kind packed a pit bounded by NE 2nd Ave., Sweat Records' north-facing façade, and cop cars. Party boys poured beer on each other for heat relief. Locals joined the party, watching the whole thing from the low-slung seats of BMX bikes. And hipster dads hoisted their offspring onto t-shirted shoulders.

Then, No Age tore into its very first squalls of distorted riffage and the crowd replied with happy violence. It all became a writhing, rumbling mess: Bodies crumbling under bodies, cameras being crushed, kids stage-diving onto the heads of newfound friends. The dads drifted into safer corners while everyone else went berserk. And miraculously, Sweatstock never veered off into negative vibes. People seemed to actually like getting repeatedly pushed and punched.